Democrats control the Senate and the White House.

[kentuck]

Why do they continue to act like the minority? Just listening to the news reports, you would think that Mitch McConnell and the Republicans run the Senate and that the White House has no role to play whatsoever.

By threats of government shutdown and economic disruption, the Republicans seem to be calling all the shots? Is there nothing the Democrats can do? What will they act like when they are the true minority?

This is just my observation. Perhaps you see it differently?

[pnwmom]

1. What do you think the White House can do that it isn't, exactly?

Do you think they can direct the Senate to pass a bill without the consent of the House?

[KharmaTrain]

2. Cause It Still Takes 60 Votes...

Because the status quo must be preserved the Senate has become totally dysfunctional. With every bill (and I'll bet that even taking a bathroom break requires 60 votes) requiring that threshold and a weak "Majority" leader, the GOTB has turned the Senate into a worthless circus of pompous egomaniacs.

The rushpublicans aren't calling the shots or we'd see a lot of their draconian bills passed (look at the House) but are in total obstructionist mode. They want this administration to fail and if that means taking the country down, the ends justify the means (or so they think).

Also there's the problems of "Blue Dogs"...the Ben Nelsons and Mary Landrieus who put their own careers and the agendas of their states ahead of the national party. They know if they're the deciding vote they can parlay it into all sorts of pork and other "favors". It's all about self-service and self-preservation.

While many here are disappointed with the lack of success of a more Progressive agenda by this administration, imagine the deep shit we would be in if the rushpublicans were really in control and calling the shots. There's be 99'ers eating out of dumpsters, those with existing conditions who would be told to "gut it out" with no insurance and bin Laden would still be playing with his satellite TV.

Politics has long been called the "art of the possible". The system was designed to give the minority party some rights and to encourage compromise for the "national good". Unfortunately in these highly partisan times that "national good" is interpreted differently depending on whose "interest" and "good" is being looked at...

[kentuck]

4. The 'art of the possible'?

Was it not possible to change the 60-vote rule? What would the deficit reduction be right now if they had permitted the Bush taxcuts to expire? That was their call, was it not?

[KharmaTrain]

6. Reid Didn't Have The Votes For Even That...

Originally the 60 vote rule was used only sparringly...but it was McConnell who has used it as a way to obstruct any legislation he doesn't like from moving forward. You ask if it wasn't possible to change the 60-vote rule (one that's been an endless frustration on this end for a long time). Sure they could, but they won't. Here's the rub...firstly the Democrats apparently didn't have the votes to change the rules or didn't want so. There was a push in the caucus to eliminate the 60 vote rule and it didn't get party approval. One reason is the fear that this change could be used against them down the road. (Yes its stupid, but this is repeatedly what I keep hearing). Remember a couple years ago the rushpublicans promised to exercize the "nuclear option" to eliminate the 60 vote rule and the Democrats (and many here) were aghast.

Regarding the boooosh cuts...sadly there were Democrats who wanted to keep it going. They feared losing the big money that their campaigns and careers rely on. Also remember that those cuts were extended in horsetrading for the extension of unemployment benefits for the 99'ers and the passing of DADT. Now was extending those breaks for a year worth passing those other bills? That's your personal call.

Right now the biggest call inside the beltway are the ones made by those who can write the $2300 checks.

Cheers...

[eomer]

25. The budget reconciliation process requires only 50 votes in the Senate.

Democrats could have enacted critical changes with it, like increasing tax rates on the wealthy.

Now it is too late, of course, with Republican control of the House.

Although one of the most important changes, ending the wars, can be done whenever the President decides to without a single vote.

[KharmaTrain]

30. And DADT & The 99'ers Would Have Been Left Behind...

I was and am fully in favor of letting the tax breaks for the rich to expire and was last year. Even with budget reconcilliation you had Blue Dogs like Ben Nelson, Liebermann, Baccus and enough votes that would have forced the cuts to stay in place with nothing in return. Now we can discuss the poor Senate leadership that led to that compromise but the administration negotiated the one year extention in return for the passage of DADT and providing extra benefits for those who had seen theirs expire...the 99'ers. So which is more important? I could easily say since I'm not Gay nor the long-term uneployed that Obama "sold out" on the tax cuts, but I also saw the passage of DADT & those extended benefits as more important and well worth putting off the cuts to the rich for one year. Now let's see if this administration follows through in repealing these cuts later this year or if they'll get behind the 8-ball again.

Ending the wars is one thing, bringing the troops home is another...and a another topic...

[eomer]

38. Yes, but what we don't know...

is what kind of deals Obama and the leadership could have gotten if they had been negotiating just within the Democratic caucus.

Rather than seize the opportunity to use reconciliation and thereby negotiate with just a few blue dog Democrats, instead they pretended that option didn't exist and so they negotiated with Republicans. I'm pretty sure they could have gotten a better deal negotiating with just Democrats and I think in fact that's why they didn't do it. I believe they actually wanted the worse deal because that's what Obama's corporate sponsors (and corporatists within his admin) demanded.

I do believe that Obama is very clever at chess; it's just that we're not the ones he's doing it on behalf of.

[Lorien]

7. Bush got everything he wanted with a Dem congress and a simple majority of votes

so that argument doesn't fly.

[KharmaTrain]

9. False Equivelency

Booosh had a rushpublican dominated legislature for 5 of his 8 years...especially 2003-2007. He also had Democrat enablers such as Nelson and Zell Miller as well as Lieberman and Baucus who horsetraded like there was no tomorrow. Dare we remember that it was a Senator Hillary Clinton who casted a vote in favor of the Iraq invasion? The situation is different now.

There had been few organized Democratic efforts in those days to push for the 60 vote threshold...and the fear that doing so would lead the rushpublicans to exercize the "nuclear option" to eliminate the 3/5th threshold and then ram through everything with simple majorities. This was a real fear when the nominations of Roberts and Alito came about and in the end enough Democrats caved to allow these horrible choices to be sitting on the court. The "widsom" then was these were the best of the worst.

It's simple to broadbrush "booosh got it all" without looking at a bigger picture then and now. The rushpublican party has veered so far to the right that it no longer compromises. In the past there were those who "crossed over" now it's "no prisoners" in the other side. It's strict orthodoxy. Is this what you suggest the Democrats do as well? If so, good luck.

[SDuderstadt]

24. "Democrat enablers"

"Democrat" is not an adjective. Please quit helping the GOP perpetuate this smear.

[vssmith]

13. He wasn't able to priviatize Social Security

[BzaDem]

27. And his immigration plan failed, as did his ANWR drilling plan, as did tort reform, as did the final

pro-HMO "patients bill of rights" that would have capped lawsuits against HMOs to a ridiculously low level, etc.

In reality, Bush got very little of what he wanted. He got the stuff that could be passed with reconciliation (tax cuts) and the stuff that had wide bipartisan support (Medicare part D). That's it.

[Zorra]

35. Senate Democrats could have eliminated the filibuster back in Feb. 2008.

They could have passed all the progressive legislation they wanted to. Think about the mass amounts of nation saving legislation that they could have passed if they had ended the filibuster. IMO, we probably would not have lost the House if Democrats had the spine to do what was right for the people of his country rather than what is right for multinational corporations and their bottom line. They flat out should have ended the filibuster.

When the status quo becomes lethal to democracy and the welfare of the people, there is no sense in preserving it whatsoever.

It comes down to this for the Senate: Either take away republicans' power to bully you and be free to to what you want, or let republicans bully you and keep you locked and handcuffed in the Senate basement.

Changing Senate rules is not something that should be done on a whim. But even my dog knew that the republicans were going to filibuster everything after the election of 2008. And that is exactly what they did. And they are still doing it. When a situation becomes impossible, and you have an effective way to change it constructively, than that's what you do.

I refuse to give Sen. Reid/Senate leadership a pass. And so does my dog, BTW. If politics is the "art of the possible", than Reid and the crew should quit politics and go get lobbying jobs for whichever industry they currently primarily represent, because they apparently either don't understand what is possible or don't care to do what is possible when it comes down to doing the possible right things for the welfare of the majority of Americans.

How To End the Filibuster Forever
The Senate can kill the rule any time! And with only 51 votes.
By Akhil Reed Amar and Gary Hart

Is the Senate like Cinderella—does it have the power to transform itself in only one limited moment, at the opening of the new Congress? That is one of the two big questions in the filibuster-reform debate that is now taking center stage in the United States Senate. The other is whether the Senate can change the filibuster rule by a simple majority vote, regardless of what the rule itself seems to say. The short answers to these questions are that there are no magic moments in the Senate and no need to muster 60 votes to repeal the filibuster rule. The upper house has the clear constitutional authority to end the filibuster by simple majority vote on any day it chooses.
snip--
The Times and others are right about the power of the simple majority—more about why in a minute—but wrong about the Cinderella power of the Senate's opening day. A simple majority of determined senators may lawfully change the filibuster rules, even if the existing Senate rules say otherwise, at any time.
snip---
Unlike the House, the Senate need not begin its session by approving procedural rules. The internal Senate rule allowing filibusters—Senate Rule 22—is not approved biennially at the outset of each new congressional term. Rather, this old rule, initially adopted by the Senate in the 1910s and significantly revised in the 1970s, simply carries over from one Congress to the next by inertia, since the Senate is a continuing body. Similarly, on Day One in the Senate, no leadership elections need occur. The old Senate's leaders simply continue in place, and the Senate can oust the old leaders at any time—by a simple majority vote. The same goes for old rules, including the filibuster rule. It's that simple.
snip---Unlike the House, the Senate need not begin its session by approving procedural rules. The internal Senate rule allowing filibusters—Senate Rule 22—is not approved biennially at the outset of each new congressional term. Rather, this old rule, initially adopted by the Senate in the 1910s and significantly revised in the 1970s, simply carries over from one Congress to the next by inertia, since the Senate is a continuing body. Similarly, on Day One in the Senate, no leadership elections need occur. The old Senate's leaders simply continue in place, and the Senate can oust the old leaders at any time—by a simple majority vote. The same goes for old rules, including the filibuster rule. It's that simple.
snip--
In fact, neither house has ever formally prescribed a supermajority rule for formal amendment of its rules. Not even Senate Rule 22 has the audacity to openly assert that it cannot be repealed by simple majority vote. Rather, the filibuster rule says that debate on its own repeal cannot be ended this way. If Rule 22 simply means that it should not be repealed without a fair opportunity to debate the repeal, then it is fully valid. But insofar as Rule 22 allows repeal opponents to stall interminably so as to prevent a majoritarian vote from ever being held, then Rule 22 unconstitutionally entrenches supermajority rule. It's a question for each senator to decide for him- or herself—and then to act on, by simple majority rule, just as the framers intended.

http://www.slate.com/id/2280238

[Obamanaut]

3. And for a while the control was of all three, and we still had pretty much

the same.

'Control' by one group or the other doesn't matter, they will look after their own interests first.

[CrispyQ]

5. I believe the dems actually prefer to be the minority party,

as it gives them an excuse as to why the party can't implement change.

[Obamanaut]

8. That response caused an actual 'LOL'..Thanks. nt

[randr]

10. When I hear the vote on oil company subsides I want to scream

52 to 48 is a win. The reporting should be that the democrat's refused to hold the republican's to the fire and make them filibuster as threatened.
If the repubs were indeed filibustering a vote to end oil company subsides, can you imagine how fired up the country would get?

[elocs]

11. Democrats fight using Marquess of Queensberry Rules,

Republicans fight a street fight and only use rules if they benefit them.

Obama should have employed the same attitude he used in going after OBL, the Chicago Way, and if Republicans did not respect him they would at least fear him.

The Chicago Way: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOvH-7lcjb0

Alas, we likely have too many Philistines in our camp for the Chicago Way ever to work. Yes, if only our president had the same grit and determination he had to get and bring down OBL and used it against the Republicans instead of looking for that Kumbaya moment where we can all reason together. The problem is that the Republicans have no reason.

[bemildred]

12. Because that's what they want, that's why. nt

[tavalon]

14. Because there are two heads to the hydra

And honestly, each side of the head is more comfortable with the usual behaviors so the minority continues to rule and the majority continues to grovel. I've been calling them all corporaticans for a long time and well, I don't think I'm the lone canary.

[OnionPatch]

15. Yes!!!!

I am so SICK, SICK, SICK of the media propaganda that the Republicans "have control". Since when does having a majority in ONE branch of government mean you have control? I guess since the Democrats became a bunch of spineless sheep.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

16. Not spineless sheep but willing participants to help their corporate masters.

[OnionPatch]

20. You're probably correct.

So sad our county has come to this.

[ThomWV]

17. We do not Control the Senate, we simply have a majority of Senators in our caucus

Control of the Senate belongs to the Republicans. The same is true in the House, as true now as when they were the miniority Party. However in the White House we have the one person who is in Control - but how has that worked out?

[KittyWampus]

18. You've been posting here for years and yet you still don't understand the basics?

Kind of sad.

Or maybe you just want to stir shit up?

[dionysus]

23. i'll take stir for 500 alex

[Dont_Bogart_the_Pretzel]

19. We might control the Senate, but we could get A LOT more done if

the Bluedogs would vote down party line like the repukes always do.



U.S. politic would be so much better if we didn't have Dino's or Bluedogs.

[Johonny]

21. Mixed congresses are always unproductive

Since what the Republicans are saying is extremely unpopular, there is no reason not to let them keep talking.

[dionysus]

22. bills originate in the GOP controlled house and the senate GOP fillubusters everything. it's a fact.

they're effectively able to block anything they want to.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

26. Because the problem lies with Senate rules. It is not a filibuster-proof Senate, so there's nothing

that can be done. And yes, there are still, believe it or not, Blue Dog Bastars like Joe Manchin, and Mary Landrieau who are bought and paid for by the oil and gas industries.

Because we failed to elect more progressives, we suffer these consequences.

[BzaDem]

28. Democrats blocked many pieces of legislation and several judges when Bush controlled the Senate and

WH (and House). As mentioned above, some examples include SS privatization, immigration, ANWR drilling, tort reform, a pro-HMO lawsuit cap against insurance companies, and several appellate court judges. That was how Democrats acted when they were a true minority.

Republicans were saying the same thing about "Democrats calling all the shots" back then.

It is a respectable position to say that neither side should be able to block the other side's agenda, and to call out Republican obstruction that goes above and beyond what Democrats did under Bush. But we shouldn't pretend that "Bush got everything he want" when in reality that is far from the truth.

[SDuderstadt]

36. Exactly...

Remember when Frist kept blustering about the "nuclear option"?

My, how quickly some among us forget.

[quaker bill]

29. What realistic things do you suppose they could do?

As long as they have enough votes, the party prepared to throw the nation under the bus always calls the shots.

[kentuck]

32. So, are you saying?

The most we can expect from the Democrats is to keep the Republicans at bay until they win their next election? Democrats are holding the fort?

[Bubba Kush]

31. Because there are the status quo

That's why I'm for cleaning the house of old staid assholes, and force a two 6 year term limits for all Senators and all Congresspeople go through this yearly, instead of every two years.

[blindpig]

33. Because they have the same agenda as the minority....

but can't come out and say it for electoral reasons. Their constituency believes them to be a check on capitalism but in truth they are just as capitalist as the Republicans, differences are of nuance and style. They appear hapless and blame the Republicans for everything to their constituency while getting the job done for those who they really answer to.

Our so-called democracy is sham for control by the capitalist class.

[Zorra]

37. Exactly. You totally nailed it with this statement:

"They appear hapless and blame the Republicans for everything to their constituency while getting the job done for those who they really answer to."
:thumbsup:

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

34. Gimme a break

We owned the fucking government for two solid years and did jack shit acting like the GOP was in charge. You expect them to do anything now? Owning the Senate by two votes is not a big deal.